Winning Streak Reaches Four Games with Penguins OTW
The Pittsburgh Penguins extend their winning streak to four games after rebounding from a four-game losing streak.
The NHL trade deadline is under 24 hours away but the Pittsburgh Penguins had an important game against the Tampa Bay Lightning to worry about.
Thanks to dropping Brock McGinn and Mark Friedman to the AHL, trading away Teddy Blueger, and adding Mikael Granlund, the Penguins had a new look to their lineup as they looked for their fourth straight victory.
It didn’t take long for the Lightning to get a lead after a shot deflected up into the head and face area of Kris Letang.
After hitting Letang up high, the puck bounced around and found its way past Tristan Jarry.
Letang was left bloodied and went to the locker room for repairs; he did not return for the rest of the first period.
Despite a few really good chances on the power play, the Penguins failed to get a tying goal prior to the end of the first period.
The Penguins were down one after the first period, but led in shots 13-8.
Without Letang to start the second period, Petry took over as the offensive threat from the blue line.
Petry proved that by scoring a pair of goals 25 seconds apart to give the Penguins a 2-1 lead.
The Lightning picked up a power play goal to tie the game at two, but the Penguins wouldn’t go away.
A huge stretch pass from Marcus Pettersson found Jason Zucker for a break away.
Zucker very calmly pushed it under the pads of Andrei Vasilevskiy to give the Penguins a 3-2 lead and extend a goal streak to three games.
In the closing minutes of the second period, both Letang and Petry took puck over glass penalties giving the Lighting a 5-in-3 advantage.
The Penguins were able to kill off the two-man disadvantage between the end of the second period and start of the third, but the Lightning capitalized just as the penalties ended.
Head coach Mike Sullivan said prior to the game that Granlund would be implemented into the penalty kill while getting used to the systems.
Granlund was a main feature for the Penguins PK during the 5-on-3 situation.
Drew O’Connor has been making a real name for himself over the last couple of weeks and he continued to solidify his spot in the lineup with a power move to again give the Penguins the lead.
Utilizing his size, O’Connor out-muscled a Lightning defender and just down right beat Vasilevskiy over his glove side.
After the Penguins power play continued to struggle, the Lightning took advantage of the momentum gained from a penalty kill.
The Lightning once again knotted the score as time ran down late in the third period.
With the score tied at four, the Penguins and Lightning were heading to overtime.
After a fairly sloppy start to the overtime period from both teams, Zucker ripped a bullet for the game winner.
Thanks to Zucker's heroics, the Penguins seal the season sweep over the Lightning and extend their winning streak to four games and continue their push for the postseason in the right direction.
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